I Hope This Doesn’t Find You Review // subject: pls breathe babe

to: ihopethisdoesntfindyou@review.com

Subject: pls breathe babe, i’m concerned rn

It seems only fitting that this review is in email form — after all, “I Hope This Doesn’t Find You” was pitched as Lara Jean if she wrote hate emails instead of love letters. 

And honestly, that’s a pretty apt description of what goes down. 

Sadie Wen is the pinnacle of academic overachiever, and she does with ease. Well, more accurately she gaslights everyone around her into thinking she is perfectly A-OK and not on the verge of a complete and total breakdown. Sure, Sadie has her moments where she wants to scream into the abyss — I mean, who doesn’t? — but she manages to plaster on a smile, write a strongly worded email to vent about it, and just keeps swimming. 

That is, until her emails get leaked and her carefully crafted people-pleasing world comes crashing down.

Toss in some “mirrorball” and “this is my trying” core, definitely some fire sign energy, a slightly unhealthy need for academic validation, and a whole lotta unresolved anger and that’s “I Hope This Doesn’t Find You” in a nutshell.

But for all of Sadie Wen’s faults — not that she’d concede she has any — I have to admit: hate writing emails is a semi-healthy coping mechanism if you squint. I mean, it’s no more aggressive than writing in a diary (though a digital literacy class about the impacts of one’s online footprint would have gone crazy). I’d be more concerned if she threw axes at the guy’s school photo. Or tried to set him ablaze with her eyes. Or even worse, created a life-sized voodoo doll to keep in a shed in the middle of the woods behind the school where she could torture her victims vicariously with landscaping tools, starting with a with an electric hedge trimmer. 

Just saying, writing means emails is objectively better than becoming Slappy the Dummy wood chips. (Seriously, freaky!) 

Sure, the emails were… hmm, how do you say… threateningly intimate? 

“Sometimes I dream about throttling you. I would do it slowly. I would do it when you weren’t ready, when you were relaxed. I imagine wrapping my hands around your long, pale throat and watching the fear bloom in your eyes. I imagine your skin turning red, your breathing quickening as you struggle. I want to watch you in pain, up close. I want you to beg me. I want you to admit you were wrong, that I’ve won. Maybe you would even sink to your knees for me. Plead for mercy. That would be fun, but even then, that wouldn’t be enough.” 

Like, girl. Be so for real right now. There is simply no way Sadie thought this and was like, “Yeah. For sure. This is a thought I should document on paper for all historians email lurkers to read.” She is such a hater — to a concerning extent sometimes — but I am so here for it. 

Never have I ever been so simultaneously horrified and entertained; Sadie’s insults were downright hilarious at times, finding the perfect combination of personally niche and just mean enough to pick below the surface. But she protected her peace (kinda), so whatever works. Unlike Sadie’s mind, this is a judgment free zone. 

This behind-the-curtain look at Sadie’s inner thoughts is an ideal contrast for her people pleasing tendencies; if her internal monologue is littered with slightly evil “inside thoughts,” it would have been harder to like her character. Instead, the stark contrast between the emails, Sadie’s internal monologue, and her frantic actions trying to satisfy everyone left plenty of room for a compelling character arc. 

 “I really can’t stand it when people are angry at me. Like, I know it might be simple for others, but I can’t focus on anything else. I can’t just forget about it and go on with my own life. It’s like there’s something hard wedged inside my chest. I’ll always feel guilty. I’ll always want to make amends.”

Sadie standing up for herself didn’t have to be email-screaming “I really hope your comb breaks and you run out of whatever expensive hair products you’ve been using to make your hair appear deceptively soft” at Julian, but it could be a Goldilocks dose of assertiveness in her day-to-day interactions. It’s all about moderations — a concept that is completely foreign to Sadie. 

Liang truly understands her sweet spot and target audience — slightly obsessive girlies with a need for validation (academic or otherwise) — and hits it out of the park with the likes of Alice Sun, Eliza Lin, and, now, Sadie Wen. They are me; I am them. And I will continue reading Liang’s books and feeling called out. What can I say: I’m just a girl. 

“I’m so tired of playing nice, of smiling as people walk over me. What I’m realizing is that if you’re quiet about the things that hurt you, people are only going to mistake your tolerance for permission. And they’re going to hurt you again and again.”

While Sadie’s story arc was compelling (@ the mid people pleasing arcs I’ve read in the past month), the side characters could have used some of the same zest. Sadie — and by extension the narration — was so wrapped up in what she thought everyone else was thinking, not what actually motivated them below the surface. Especially for secondary characters Abigail and Julian, I wanted to know what made them tick. There was only the compulsive need to satisfy, not compelling motivations. Sure, “I Hope This Doesn’t Find You” showed glimpses — just not quite enough to fully sell it. 

Luckily, it’s easy to put some of “I Hope This Doesn’t Find You’s” minor faults aside for the majority of successes, which wouldn’t be complete without mentioning the motherload of academic rivals-to-lovers romance. 

Because oh. my. god. 

“I Hope This Doesn’t Find You” goes wild in a way that is unfathomable to the rest of the YA contemporary genre. I’m taking obsessive pining, honest-to-god mean banter (positive connotation), and more tension than exists at the dinner table when my grandpa brings up politics. Sadie and Juliance’s relationship arc goes beyond the typical rivals-to-lovers; it’s angsty and angry in a truly fantasy-esque way. 

Basically, it’s fantastic. 

And really, that’s what I keep coming back to: “I Hope This Doesn’t Find You” is fantastic. It was fantastic when I was kicking my feet as I binge read the entirety of its contents on a flight from D.C. It was fantastic with each confession and each heartfelt moment. It was fantastic — even as I look back with jaded I-read-that-weeks-ago glasses.   

It’s just fan-freaking-tastic. It’d be truly remiss if this one didn’t find you; I hope that it does. 

xoxo, 

april 

p.s. im begging you to try therapy